Jay Bates router lift

This is my first shop made tool. I’m happy with it but I also learned how much of a hack I really am in the shop. Miraculously everything wound up square and flush in the end though, which was a nice bonus.

I was also surprised how many tools it took to make a tool… table saw, band saw, jig saw, oscillating spindle sander, lots of loose sandpaper, plunge router, trim router, Dremel tool, 2 drills, countersink bit, brad point bits, metal drilling bits, forster bits, wrenches, sockets, glues and epoxies, hammer, and the occasional dead-blow for persuasion. Holy smokes, sometimes just buying the dang thing is better. But it was fun.

I’m sure I saved some money doing it myself, but it wasn’t exactly cheap. I got plywood from the scratch and dent bin for $20 a sheet, but hardware alone was $50, then there’s the T-track and dust collection port, and of course all the screws, glues, and epoxies. I’ve got about $100 into this not including the router. And some time. Lots of time.

I made a few changes – the router I mounted is only a 3.5” “medium” sized router which changed the carriage slightly, and I mounted it 90 degrees to the way Jay did just because of my shop layout. I also added a small chamfer to the bottom of the movable fence plates to keep a little sawdust from interfering with precision.

I don’t yet have electrical service to run both my dust collector and another tool at the same time (I know, don’t ask). Dust collection is okay adapting a shop vac to the 4-inch port in the carriage. This design is really centered around lots of airflow to cool the router and extract all the chips and dust. I suspect it will be great when I can get my DC running simultaneously.